Sunday, April 7, 2013

2012 - THE SAPPHIRES, is slick but entertaining.

Well here's an interesting idea for a film, dramatize the real life story of an Aboriginal singing group who toured in Vietnam during the war. The film was co written by the son of one of the women in the group and the opening credits say inspired by the true story. They should have put the word "inspired" in very large font because I doubt there was a whole lot of real life story that made it into this film.

That said, this is a very entertaining film for what it is. The film has lots of great old soul music, pretty appealing performances from the female cast, humor, a little social criticism and a secret audience pleasing weapon.

The secret weapon is the actor Chris O'Dowd as the burnout manager of the group. O'Dowd basically steals the film and saves it with his funny and sly performance. He helps keep the audience connected to all the improbable plot turns in the film and there are a lot of improbable plot turns in this thing.

The Sapphires is the kind of film you can take your date on. Your wife/girlfriend will love the girl and love story parts and the boys in the theater can enjoy the shooting and explosions during the Vietnam scenes, something for everyone.